At last I’m able to update this blog. My apologies to all of you who’ve been waiting for my updates. FOB Warhorse was a challenging place. I’m back in LSAA now so I’ll update the days I missed. Let’s start with this past Monday.
We pick the story back up with my team and I still trying to fly to FOB Warhorse. Two nights in a row we’ve been turned away. The past two nights it was because of the persistent sandstorm. This morning came bright and clear. The threat of another cancelled flight was rapidly diminishing. When our flight cancelled the night before, I received help from a KBR representative of Catfish Air in getting “space-blocked” on another flight. Unfortunately, Catfish had no flights to Warhorse for Monday night. However, Destiny Air had seats available. Destiny Air is co-located with Catfish and coordinates all the CH47 flights. There were three seats available so we took them. I had five people designated for the mission so the other two would be space available. The stage was set.
Around noon I received a call from our operations officer. He had bad news. Our flight had been cancelled for “tactical reasons.” I had no idea what that meant. There was another flight but we’d all be space available. It was our only recourse. Due to the number of cancelled flights the past few days I had a bad feeling about getting on a helicopter. We’d go through the motions though. There was always a chance. The day as a whole was uneventful. I let the mission soldiers leave early to get ready. We had a show time of 2230 at Destiny Air. I left the office, squeezed in a workout, and ate a shitty supper of sickeningly soft spaghetti.
When we arrived at Destiny Air the pax terminal was packed. The stand-by line for the FOB Warhorse line was twelve deep. In layman’s terms, that ain’t good. We went ahead and put our names on the list. It was looking highly unlikely that we’d fly. Both CH47’s were already almost full with people who were space-blocked. My team was aware and suggested that we not stick around. However, I clung to the small hope that we’d still make the flight, that somehow there would be room for us.
Around midnight the representative from Destiny Air came out and made roll call. We all lined up, geared up, and headed out on the flight line. The two CH47’s landed and we waited for the crew chief. After he spoke with the Destiny representative the first ten or so soldiers from the flight line were allowed to board the lead aircraft. The rest of us were turned around to leave – no more room. However, just as we were clearing the trail helicopter another representative from Destiny ran up to me and asked me to stand by. He came back about a minute later and said “Ok sir! You can come on the trail bird!” I looked at him and yelled, “I can’t go without my team!” He asked how many there were and ran back to talk to the crew chief. When he returned he held up three fingers. I immediately turned to my team, grabbed two of them and we all waved goodbye to the other two. We literally had to leave them standing on the flight line. Then we boarded the trail CH47. It was already full so soldiers at the rear had to squeeze to make room. We got a lot of disgusted looks. It didn’t matter though. Shortly after we took off and made the short flight to Warhorse. All the other passengers must’ve been going somewhere else because when we touched down at Warhorse my team was the only people to exit the aircraft. Our contact was there to meet us and in no time he (a sergeant from the Striker Brigade) had us checked into our billets for the night. I settled into my CHU and was soon fast asleep. It took three straight days of trying but we finally made it to Warhorse.
We pick the story back up with my team and I still trying to fly to FOB Warhorse. Two nights in a row we’ve been turned away. The past two nights it was because of the persistent sandstorm. This morning came bright and clear. The threat of another cancelled flight was rapidly diminishing. When our flight cancelled the night before, I received help from a KBR representative of Catfish Air in getting “space-blocked” on another flight. Unfortunately, Catfish had no flights to Warhorse for Monday night. However, Destiny Air had seats available. Destiny Air is co-located with Catfish and coordinates all the CH47 flights. There were three seats available so we took them. I had five people designated for the mission so the other two would be space available. The stage was set.
Around noon I received a call from our operations officer. He had bad news. Our flight had been cancelled for “tactical reasons.” I had no idea what that meant. There was another flight but we’d all be space available. It was our only recourse. Due to the number of cancelled flights the past few days I had a bad feeling about getting on a helicopter. We’d go through the motions though. There was always a chance. The day as a whole was uneventful. I let the mission soldiers leave early to get ready. We had a show time of 2230 at Destiny Air. I left the office, squeezed in a workout, and ate a shitty supper of sickeningly soft spaghetti.
When we arrived at Destiny Air the pax terminal was packed. The stand-by line for the FOB Warhorse line was twelve deep. In layman’s terms, that ain’t good. We went ahead and put our names on the list. It was looking highly unlikely that we’d fly. Both CH47’s were already almost full with people who were space-blocked. My team was aware and suggested that we not stick around. However, I clung to the small hope that we’d still make the flight, that somehow there would be room for us.
Around midnight the representative from Destiny Air came out and made roll call. We all lined up, geared up, and headed out on the flight line. The two CH47’s landed and we waited for the crew chief. After he spoke with the Destiny representative the first ten or so soldiers from the flight line were allowed to board the lead aircraft. The rest of us were turned around to leave – no more room. However, just as we were clearing the trail helicopter another representative from Destiny ran up to me and asked me to stand by. He came back about a minute later and said “Ok sir! You can come on the trail bird!” I looked at him and yelled, “I can’t go without my team!” He asked how many there were and ran back to talk to the crew chief. When he returned he held up three fingers. I immediately turned to my team, grabbed two of them and we all waved goodbye to the other two. We literally had to leave them standing on the flight line. Then we boarded the trail CH47. It was already full so soldiers at the rear had to squeeze to make room. We got a lot of disgusted looks. It didn’t matter though. Shortly after we took off and made the short flight to Warhorse. All the other passengers must’ve been going somewhere else because when we touched down at Warhorse my team was the only people to exit the aircraft. Our contact was there to meet us and in no time he (a sergeant from the Striker Brigade) had us checked into our billets for the night. I settled into my CHU and was soon fast asleep. It took three straight days of trying but we finally made it to Warhorse.
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